


Grift

by fandomghostwriter



Series: TFR Dialogue Prompts [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Lost Love, M/M, Reunions, grifter!Lance, klance, soldier!Keith
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-15
Updated: 2018-02-15
Packaged: 2019-03-18 19:26:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13688214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fandomghostwriter/pseuds/fandomghostwriter
Summary: Lance is a grifter and runs into Keith during a job.TFR prompt seventy six:"Nice to see you.""Yes, I know, I got fat."





	Grift

**Author's Note:**

> I take requests! By the same name on Tumblr, fandomghostwriter.tumblr.com

"Nice to see you."

"Yes, I know, I got fat."

There weren't very many downsides to Lance's job--if it could be called that, which Lance did, especially amongst those new and still slightly skittish to the field. He traveled to exotic places, went to the most elite parties, and conned the rich and powerful out of millions of dollars in both assets and cold hard cash every year, though decadent pieces of art were his specialty. It was nice to be in possession of beautiful and pretty things before passing them to buyers, or keeping pieces he couldn't bear to part with for his portfolio. He was good at what he did. 

He didn't mind the jobs where he had to play uncomfortable characters--in this case, an overweight and gluttonous heir losing all of the figures in his trust to other, skinnier, prettier heirs of the same generation. It was a part of a long and complicated con that involved a lot of set up and a golden monkey. Of course, he preferred to play the disarmingly pretty arm candy that could outwit any number of these boys, but after this job he'd have enough money to buy a vacation on an island that specialized in servicing young and dumb elites one slip up from losing everything overnight in a riot of debauchery and general disgrace. Call it an investment. 

The downside of the job of pretending to be someone he else was when he ran into someone who knew who he was. It threw a wrench in everything and forced him to play two games at once if his past acquaintance stuck around, which Lance could do, but preferred not to. Perhaps he wouldn't mind if it wasn't his ex, looking unkempt in that handsome way of his in a suit and ill-styled hair, a champagne flute held between his fingers like a rose, while he looked like the break up had completely gotten the best of him.

"Did you? I hadn't noticed."

This was infuriating. He wasn't even being sarcastic. Either he genuinely had not noticed or he was being kind. Lance wasn't sure which was worse. 

The latex glued to his face felt suffocating, the padding around his body like lead weights. He wanted to be in sequins and diamonds, silk outlining exactly how much better off he was. The effort would probably be in vain, Keith wouldn't notice that either. He would just look in his eyes and see down into him, past every facade he could ever cast up. 

That was what had hung Lance up on him, what made him consider leaving his job for him, a job that pivoted around knowing exactly who people were and how they ticked while keeping yourself hidden behind a veil so well woven no one could see past it. Keith was always a mystery to Lance, and Lance had always been an open book to Keith. At first, it had angered him enough to make a mortal enemy out of Keith, but Keith had seen through that as well, and had patiently waited for Lance's antics to end. And then they had fallen in love.

Duty called Keith away, and Lance had been heartbroken. By the time Keith had been discharged again, Lance was buried under five layers of illegal schemes and obscurity that finding him on purpose was impossible. Lance had worked hard to be sure of that. And now here they were, coincidence making a fool of all of Lance's efforts.

"You look..." Lance crossed his arms, slipping out of the character he had to meticulously crafted. The professional side of his brain told him not to get sidetracked. The more prevalent part of his brain, the petty part, the part that had ruined so many jobs in the past, told him to stay and make Keith feel every stitch of pain his leaving had brought to him in one hellacious fit. He wondered how effective such a fit would be with jiggling jowls.

Then his heart gave when he saw the honesty and openness of Keith's eyes. Keith liked to think he always kept people away with his aloofness and generally poor social skills, not to mention the violent outbursts, and though Lance could never seem to figure him out, he had always been the only honest thing Lance had ever found, and he had kept him, and for once, Keith had no protestations. 

Lance dropped how he was going to end that sentence. "What are you doing here?"

"Shiro believes prestige within the military comes with both accomplishment and diplomacy," he says in a tone that shows he doesn't entirely believe this, or in the value of it. Lance can't tell. If this happened in a mark that would be a major downfall. Does he play to the credibility of this Shiro, or in the value of titles and decorum? He  _can't tell._ Then again, he'd never had to 'play to' anything with Keith. 

Keith gestures over to a group of well dressed, muscular men, all a bit too rough for the elegance of the party, as those who rise through accomplishment and not inheritance tend to be, and one in particular with a scar across the bridge of his nose and a shock of white in the front of his hair. Lance knew of him, Shiro the war hero, imprisoned and tortured as a POW and had revealed nothing. He's tall, strong, brave and accomplished, acknowledged, powerful. A whole list of qualities Lance could pretend to be, could craft a character around, but never be. He sees the way Keith looks at him.

"I see." He carefully controls his voice, and stands as proudly as he can in his fat suit.

Keith looks back to Lance, as always seeing right past his affects. "No, it's not like--"

"Hey, Jorge, come on, we're waiting for you to lose your money here."

Lance's skin crawls. He looks over his shoulder and gives an awkward thumbs up, true to character but nothing like he wanted to appear to Keith right now. 

"Jorge?" Keith asks.

"Nickname, you know, the whole Latino thing," Lance struggles. "Fun guys, when you get to know them..." He'd successfully lied to dictators, stars, the people who controlled the dictators and the stars. Never to Keith. 

"Lance, what's going on?" Keith asks, and his stance changes. "Lance, if you're in trouble--"

Lance can't take it. Can't take the knight in battered armor if he doesn't get to leave this tall tower with him. He leaves.

III

Lance ditches the con that night. Jorge will disappear, they'll figure out he was a grifter and move on. 

Lance goes to his hotel room and rips his clothes and fat suit off, grabbing the latex off of his face and throwing it all in the trash. Jorge is dead, he'll never use him again. He blasts affirmative feminine music as he does his makeup, slips into a tight suit, puts a diamond choker he earned from conning a CEO a handful of years ago around his neck. He's now Lance McClain, for the first time in a long time. If he was going to play one of his pretty boy characters, he'd perhaps be a bit more dramatic with the outfit. But he gives himself a more natural beauty. While his characters need to be identified, be the full extent of themselves just from a glance across a crowded room, he gives himself more room to fill with his personality, which was far more dramatic than any false eyelashes he possessed, which was truly saying something. He had a pair with feathers and sequins. 

Finding where Keith was staying wasn't difficult. The basic hacking skills he'd learned from his colleague Pidge were more than enough to locate the hotel room. Getting in after knocking and no one answered required a phone call, in which Pidge cursed him out for calling her for a personal escapade (getting into hotel rooms on the job was never something he required assistance on, he was simply let in, and Pidge knew this), Lance promised to buy her something pretty, Pidge made promises of destruction, and the door clicked open. A usual exchange between them. If this worked out, he'd buy her a really nice robot. Maybe one that would clean that wreck of a room of hers.

What he wasn't expecting was war hero Shiro coming in first and pulling his gun on him.

Lance quickly rose to his feet and put up his hands, beginning to work on a bargaining case for his life, when Keith followed behind him.

"Wait, Shiro, that's my boyfriend."

Shiro lowers his hand but looks confused. Lance swallows.

"Ex-boyfriend," Keith amends, and asks if Shiro might be able to give them a moment. Shiro says he'll be down at the bar, and Keith makes him promise not to die, smirks on both their lips at a joke Lance didn't understand. He never understood. 

Keith gently leans against the door, looking Lance up and down. Lance couldn't discern his expression. Was he alarmed? Glad to see him?

"Yes, I know, I lost weight," Lance echoes himself from earlier, trying to wave away the mystery of him losing buck fifty like real money in the gambling den downstairs.

Keith runs a hand through his long hair. Lance has no idea how he was allowed to keep that dumb mullet in the military but is glad he didn't have to cut it. 

"What are you doing?"

"To be honest, I hadn't quite thought that far."

Keith laughs, and Lance's legs give out. He manages to translate a swoon into a dainty rest onto the couch. Damn, he'd missed that sound.  _Damn_. 

Keith slowly walks forward, his hands in his pockets. It pissed Lance off that he looked like he belonged on a runway without an ounce of effort. 

"Then what do you want from me?"

Lance's mind ran through a list he didn't know he'd already had. He didn't even need to list them off. Keith just knew from looking at him. Bastard.

"Oh."

Lance put his eyes down to the floor. Keith walked forward further, and then his fingers were on Lance's neck. Lance's skin prickled as Keith removed the necklace with featherlight precision, and traced the line from behind his ear down to his collarbone. 

"You disappeared."

"I know."

"I said I would wait for you."

"I know."

"I know I said you didn't have to wait for me, but... You just completely disappeared."

Lance can only remember one other time Keith sounded like that. They were alone in their bed, it was early morning, the sun barely showing through the edges of the drapes. Keith was telling him about his mom. Oh god. Keith thinks he abandoned him. 

"I didn't abandon you," Lance whispers.

Keith withdraws his hands and takes a step back, high and unreachable. "Then what do you call it."

Lance can't bring himself to stand. He gingerly wipes under his eye, smudged eyeliner forming a crescent at the top of his cheekbone. "I ran away."

"Ran away?"

Lance laughs without humor, burying his face in his hands. "Bet you thought you had the monopoly on fear of attachment."

Keith sits beside him. He's so close. He knows exactly which movements would put him into his lap as swiftly as possible. Keith keeps his eyes on his hands, which looked wrong without his fingerless gloves. He wondered if he'd completely ditched them or had to leave them behind just for tonight. "I missed you."

Lance knew plenty of men who would go on about the agony of being without him, how hard it was to scrape through every day without his smile, what it was like being deep in war and not knowing if he had moved on at home. Keith did none of that. He said what he had to say, and let it stand alone. He let Lance explore it, unravel the mystery and still feel like he was missing something, like if he didn't stay forever he would never know. 

Except for now he knows. He knows the detail that had escaped his notice so long. He knows what he was missing. And suddenly, Keith wasn't a mystery to him. He'd solved it, but the solution left more to be desired.

"You love me."

Keith smiles, and it's a defeated smile, directed at the ground, self-pitying. "I thought you knew."

Keith had always known exactly everything Lance knew and felt. How could he not know this? Then again, how could the grifter not know when someone was truly in love with him? "I didn't."

Lance had had more men and women than he could remember fall in love with him. It was never real, because they were never in love with him, just whatever character he'd chosen would be perfect for them to fall in love with. Not Keith. Keith could see right through everything Lance created and see what he was, and he loved what he found. It was so impossible to even fathom it had baffled Lance for years.

"I'm a grifter."

"I know."

Oh. Well, that made all his attempts to make it secret embarrassing. "People don't fall in love with me, they fall in love with who I pick for them."

"I'm not 'people.' And I fell in love with you."

They haven't looked at each other. 

"Do you love me?"

Lance looks at Keith to see he's already looking at him. He knows he sees it in him. He can see his agony of being without him, how hard it was to scrape through every day without his smile, what it was like being deep in his own life and not knowing if he was even alive overseas. However, he still waits. He needs Lance to admit it to himself. "If I do, where does that leave me?"

"I understand you have enough money to fuck off to an island and never work another day in your life."

"Maybe."

"Do you have enough money for two?"

Lance enjoys the chase of the con too much, Keith is too duty bound. Keith's fear of abandonment makes him a flight risk, Lance's fear of being too attached to something or one identity--especially his own--makes him a flight risk. Though, maybe they just might be able to fly together.

"Maybe."

Keith's fingers brush the skin inside his wrist. Lance threads their fingers together. "Are you willing to take that chance?"

Lance smiles. Genuine, too large and too toothy. His own smile. "Maybe."

**Author's Note:**

> I take requests! By the same name on Tumblr, fandomghostwriter.tumblr.com


End file.
